Lying about adultery can be legal... in Italy

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I realize this all started with a bit of adultery, but I don't see how the legal issue has been so confused with the legal issue of adultery. She wasn't charged with adultery. As far as I know, she isn't getting divorced (though that is still up in the air) and she certainly wasn't brought into court because she was. She was charged with lying to the police in the course of a criminal investigation (her hubby's abusive phone calls), about the equivalent of impeding a police investigation or withholding evidence I guess.

The point is, is lying to the police to protect your own reputation acceptable, regardless of what you are protecting your reputation from? Mind you, we aren't talking about self-incrimination here.

 

This was an investigation not of her mating habits but of an insult against her husband, a misdemeanour. Her being truthful would have only sped up the investigation. As for the question of the insult to her hubby, her affair was a side issue, illuminating side issue for sure, but nevertheless a side issue.

It is not as if Monica complained. Had she we would have been talking about Bill's sexual harassment and not about his infidelity.

Oh yes I am. I am strictly speaking about this in a context of employer-employee relations by the way.

You think too short here. The obvious reaction will be for them not to hire the applicant who refuses to answer their unwarranted question. Your legal view will reward the crooks, the folks who ask impertinent and indecent questions. That is exactly the consideration why courts have decided in favour of the liars in such cases.

To be precise: When you lie to an employer about your record to get the job that's fraud. But when an employer breaks the law by asking such questions, then the lying is justified by self defence. It is not a prospective employee's burden to accuse his crooked prospective employer of that crime if it occurs, and to maintain a high ethical standard in the working world. For his heroism he or she will in all likelihood be rewarded by unemployment, and worse, perhaps even a bad reputation for being a litigious employee. Get real. Employers have economical leverage, and asking such questions they abuse it. People need to live, and people need a job. And primarily this is about getting a job, and the de-facto right in response is a very effective deterrent, and far more effective than the long way through courts. And the courts have stressed just that in those cases.

In the catechism, yes. Legally there isn't. In my country adultery is not a criminal act since 1969.

But that's the way it is.

 

Nope, sorry, the circumstances of a crime are a part of the facts of the matter. Thus they belong to the substantive sphere, not merely the procedure.

Yes. I wouldn't prosecute the woman for lying and if they came seeking legal action against her for lying, I'd set them up for all the violations they thus committed, but this doesn't give the woman the right to lie.

By far not. You're looping there. First, if she gives them any substantive answer (i.e. not a "not your business"), she enters into conversation with them and submits to the inquiry. From that point, it will only get worse. I will agree that lying in such matters is nothing to prosecute one for, but on the other hand, what you're trying to build there stands on sand.

The only correct answer to indicent questions is, "not your business." And that's the only answer which actually protects anyone from anything.

When you hide your pregnancy to land a job and go on maternity leave for months or years from the new job which you got a couple of weeks ago, that's also fraud. To some extent employers are entitled to ask certain questions with that regard.

It's not really justified. It's just hardly deserving of punishment, much less prosecution. The one to be prosecuted is the idiot asking such questions. Doesn't make lying the right option, though, in any way. Lying is nearly always wrong and nearly always goes wrong in the end.

It's the prosecutor's job to prosecute and the employee's job may be to demand that prosecution or not, file a report or not, whatever applies (including private prosecution in some jurisdictions, sure, I guess, why not). At any rate, what you say doesn't in any way make lie look good.

Get real yourself, Rags. You're thinking about employers asking about anal sex during interviews.

Show me.

That says the code, that is why it should be like that, and because it should be like that, then it's right that it is like that, so yeah... That's right.... loooop! You can only go from premises to conclusions or the other way round, but not a there-and-back route. That'd be a bit too much cake to bite.

Really?

 

Fact finding is procedure. I concede that in this respect the question what is a legitimate question is determined by the facts of the matter. The case was about who insulted her husband if I remember rightly. And asking someone during fact finding an illegitimate question, and then pouncing on the legitimate lie is called a set-up (that is in a nutshell my verdict on Clinton's indictment).

The only business a woman has in such a situation is to protect herself and her interests. However laudable that would be, business ethics in general, ethics, morals, law abidance in society are not her business - it's not as if every citizen is a part time cop and moral guardian. For her diligence she would be rewarded with no job - and the obligation to testify in court and be faced with the prosecutor's problem of proving her accusations. Such questions are typically transmitted in speech and are not documented. It will be a 'he-said, she-said' affair, and that will be about where the prosecutor's case falls apart. Your solution is not only time consuming but ineffective. To allow lying in justified cases and to expose crooked employers to the risk of financial loss in case of misconduct is an extremely fast and effective way to sanction such behaviour.

'Chain-pregnancy-frauds' are much less frequent than you suggest, in particular when you consider Western birth rates. In those cases there are even ways for employers to get out.

... not, or not really? Do you know for sure or do you only feel uncomfortable?

When somebody beats you, and you beat back, it's self-defence. When someone asks you an illegitimate question, and you lie, it's self-defence.

Oh no. In particular it is not her job (yet; pun intended) and to me it appears peculiar in the extreme to expect that from a job applicant.

The question is fully justified considering the employer's completely legitimate interest in knowing this to be able to assess the risk of his employee being sick due to cystitis If one only wants, one can dream up a justification for any question. The obvious point aside that I was trying to cook up a particularly crass illegitimate question, you didn't answer the question of whether an employer has a right for a truthful answer on such a question.
You need to get out more. As an illustration for how creepy illegitimate questions can be: My last employer habitually did ask illegitimate questions. That was because his personal view on employer-employee relationships was in irreconcilable conflict with legal reality. In particular he told at least two female employees in introductory meetings to can their uterus for the duration of their employment, pointing at a glass on his desk, to then remark that they better make sure they're on the pill. All that with a toothy smile. Nice fella, my ex boss. What I want to say is that these things happen, and more often than you might think. With such bosses the obvious and inevitable consequence of being righteous is ending up righteous and jobless.

You could have a look at the respective decisions by the EuGH (ECJ).

My feeling about your response is that you mix up what is, and what in your personal opinion ought to be. Again, there is a difference between the Catechism and our worldly legal systems that solve worldly problems in a worldly and pragmatic albeit necessarily imperfect and morally impure way.

Oh yes.

 

Chev,
as a (late) clarification: The question about how the law ought to be is entirely legitimate, but only if it is clearly understood that it is a political question rather than a legal one, just like the question about what constitutes ethical behaviour is a perfectly legitimate philosophical question. But each has to be clearly separated from the other.